Three Months
by Illaine Waterhouse
Summary: Three moths after Reichenbach, John and Sherlock are slowly rebuilding their lives. Two-shot. Angst with a sprinkle of humor. No slash.
1. John

**Hello people! *waves***

**So I just had my winter holidays and guess what; I actually wrote a two-shot! This is angsty with a light sprinkle of humor because I can't resist puns and word games. I blame me Dad.** **Anyway, I hope you enjoy it. This one is from John's POV. The next will be from Sherlock's.**

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><p>Three months have passed. Three months since Sherlock died. Three months since a life filled with more excitement, severed body parts and casually brilliant deductions than he had ever imagined ended with brutal suddenness.<p>

He is almost used to it now. The silence, the worried looks, all the pauses he makes waiting for Sherlock to say something that they notice but never comment on. He knows he will always make those pauses, because that is a way to remember how Sherlock was every day.

There was never any sexual attraction between them. Sure, Sherlock was handsome, brilliant and mysterious, all the qualities people usually fall for, but they were just friends. Still, when Sherlock died, it was worse than when his parents died.

They had somehow developed a bond of trust and friendship deeper and stronger than all other relationships he had ever known about. A week after Sherlock died he had been aimlessly surfing the internet when he stumbled over a comment on a page he couldn't remember the name of.

"They were not gay, they were friends, can't you people accept that?" it read. "They were soul siblings, not soul mates. And they still are."

The comment was unsigned. Whoever had written it had summed up their relationship in two simple words: Soul Siblings. He had said the words over and over, tasting them, even though something went Click in his mind as he read them the first time. Yes. They were soul siblings. The name rang with a Rightness to it he had never experienced before.

He is slowly getting used to the cold, empty silence in the flat. He has cleaned the flat a little, enough for it to be okay to live in but not removing anything belonging to Sherlock. He knows he has to someday, but he wants to, no, he _needs_ to hold on to Sherlock as long as possible. He talks to Cromwell the Skull occasionally, but the stiff, fixed grin the skull always gives him unnerves him a little.

Life goes on, and he goes on, but he lingers in the past. Because the past was so infinitely better than he could ever make the present.

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><p>Three months have passed. Three months since Sherlock died.<p>

It wasn't suicide, it couldn't have been. Sherlock had been slightly depressed sometimes, and he was a bit unstable when he was bored (God, how he missed even _that_!), but he was never, ever suicidal. Sure, he could seem a little homicidal at times, when a case had gone against him or he was _really_ bored, but never, ever suicidal.

So he had been forced by Moriarty. But there was no proof, only a gut feeling that had begun to waver facing the overwhelming evidence.

He still wakes up at night and thinks he hears the violin playing, but then it stops and it never happened. In the beginning it crushed him, now he only feels rather squashed flat.

He sometimes opens the fridge and then has to sit down when there are no body parts threatening to fall out, staring blankly at him or being a general nuisance.

But he is slowly rebuilding his life, because that is what Sherlock would have wished him to do. And what better way to honor his dead friend than to do as he would have wished?

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><p><strong>So, what do you think? I'm pretty sure John named The Skull 'Cromwell' at some point, please correct me if I'm wrong. Oh and you see that nice little button there? Good. Look at it, now back here. Look at it, now back here again. Why haven't you pressed it yet?You know you want to...<br>**

**Please note that all flamers will be used to feed my balrog amy.**


	2. Sherlock

**As promised, here's part two of 'Three Months'! A day later than I promised Mrs. Pencil (Sorry!), but it's here nonetheless.  
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**I have to admit I'm a bit worried about this chapter. I dislike OOC characters** **when written unintentionally****, and I'm worried my Sherlock is OOC. I hope I didn't mess up too much.**

**Anyway, enjoy!**

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><p>Three months have passed. Three months since he 'died'.<p>

Three months since he betrayed his best friend. Seven weeks since his burial.

He went there in disguise, curious to hear what people had thought of him. And to see John. Brave, reliable John who saved his life so many times, helped him solve cases and took all the abuse he flung at the stoic Army doctor and forgave him wholeheartedly every time.

John hadn't cried in the church. Like many others his eyes remained dry, but unlike them he looked hollow and empty. A shell of his former self.

It had very nearly made him cry. That would have fitted with his disguise, but after the jump he had wowed never to shed a tear close to John again. It made him weak and vulnerable, and he detested weakness.

He misses his violin, his experiments and his skull. He even missed his scarf. But he misses John the most.

He does not love John. They are friends, nothing more and definitely nothing less.

But when he stumbled over a comment on a fan page (fan pages disgust him, but he was bored), his view on their relationship changed.

Soul siblings.

It seemed so ridiculously obvious once he had read it. Of course. He cared more for John than he cared for anyone else, but in a brotherly way. He hoped John read that comment.

He is slowly getting used to the John-shaped hole in his life. There is a skull-shaped hole, too, and a violin-shaped one, but they heal quickly. Mycroft has, for some reason, given him an _ukulele_, of all possible instruments. It sounds like a guitar accidentally shrunk in the wash and looks like one too, but he is determined to learn how to play it. It is something to _do_.

Life goes on, slow and dull, and he goes on with it. But he keeps an eye on John all the time, no matter how much it breaks his heart to see the limp return as the doctor tries to go on with the determined bravery he knows so well. Because John is his friend and soul sibling, and you look after your friends when you can.

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><p>Three months have passed. Three months since he 'died'.<p>

Three months since John Watson gradually started to break.

This is what he has feared the most. John is so strong, but when he betrayed him he broke a little. He is slowly trying to rebuild, though, and he is glad. Because that means John is healing. He still hopes that John will not heal completely, because how can he then come back? He has sworn he will, someday.

Scotland Yard is left grasping at a handful of thin threads after his supposed suicide. They blunder about, but it seems Lestrade has learned something, because after the first few fantastically grand mistakes they gradually start in the general direction of the right path.

They are still practically helpless without him, though. He aches to be at the crime scenes, but that would blow his cover. Mycroft often emails him all available information, and he is able to give small, but crucial, anonymous hints from time to time, but it isn't the same.

He misses John. He misses their arguments, his reactions to the experiments strewn around the flat, particularly his reactions to eyeballs in the fridge. The sour comment that"_if he so desperately needs to lose a staring contest then why doesn't he go to the zoo and stare down a goddamned _snake" makes him smile, if only for a moment.

He misses their flat. He misses Mrs. Hudson. He even misses Lestrade, if that is even possible.

He knows his relationship with John will never be the same. It might not even heal completely, but he'll do his damn best to repair it when he comes back. He has sworn he will, someday.

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><p><strong>I have no idea why I decided to give Sherlock an ukulele. It just... seemed like a good idea at that moment. Oh and snakes don't have eyelids.<strong>

**All reviews will not only be appreciated but devoured whole and always replied to (if signed)****. Please note that all flamers will be used to feed my Balrog army or for roasting marshmallows. Or both, because Balrogs are slow eaters.**


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